But the house wasn’t dusty at all; on the contrary, it was spotless.

Zoe Pierce sat for a moment. Once she felt her heart had completely calmed, she proactively sent a message to Damien Pierce through her Intelligent Brain.

The Intelligent Brain connected almost instantly. In a flash, Damien Pierce’s familiar yet foreign face appeared before Zoe Pierce.

"Zoe, you’re back?" Damien Pierce’s surprise turned to shock when he saw the background behind Zoe.

Zoe Pierce saw firsthand just how pale a person could become.

Like a pristine sheet of paper, the color drained from his face in an instant.

Zoe Pierce acted as if she hadn’t seen his expression. "Yes. I’m at home, waiting for you."

She gave him no time to compose himself, disconnecting the Intelligent Brain before Damien Pierce could utter his next words.

She used the time before Damien Pierce’s return to go upstairs. That ledger was still on her mind.

After a cursory glance, Zoe Pierce knew her room must have been renovated to match its original state. Everything was too new.

Her fingers pressed against the unblemished wallpaper. She remembered accidentally tearing it in this exact spot, but now it was smooth and brand-new.

She wasn’t going to find any answers here.

Zoe Pierce didn’t linger. Instead, she went to check the other rooms.

Surprisingly, only her room had been renovated. Her parents’ room hadn’t been changed in the slightest, not even the study her father had always used. The position of every object was unchanged.

’See? People are so contradictory. Logically, Damien Pierce should be rotten to the core in her eyes, yet in this regard, he’d actually done a decent job.’

Zoe Pierce went back downstairs. This time, she sat directly in the living room to wait for Damien Pierce.

When she had first started at the Federal Military Academy, she would return to this house trembling with fear. But now, it was Damien Pierce’s turn to be terrified.

Zoe Pierce didn’t have to wait long. Scarcely twenty minutes later, she heard the sound of rushing footsteps.

Zoe Pierce looked up toward the open front door, and Damien Pierce strode through it from outside.

His complexion was a little better than before, perhaps because he had hurried over, so some color had returned to his face.

"Zoe... you remember?" Damien Pierce asked, pausing as he looked at the silent Zoe Pierce on the sofa.

Zoe Pierce simply looked at Damien Pierce. "Brother. It’s been a long time."

She had learned a thing or two from being with Nathan Lockwood, after all. She knew there was no need to answer Damien Pierce’s question and instead turned the tables on him. "I just don’t understand why, Brother. Why did you have to do this?"

"I... I already fixed the ledger for you. So why... why did you have to betray me?"

As she spoke, Zoe Pierce’s emotions became genuine. She’d had no family on Earth; everything in her past life had been a result of her own struggles. But in this life, fate had blessed her with a pair of loving parents and him as her brother. She had definitely cherished that.

Because it was something she had never possessed before.

’So why? Why would the person closest to her betray her?’

’Why cover everything up? Why make her resort to seducing Miles Sherman to save the Pierce family?’

All of it, one thing after another—Zoe Pierce wanted to ask about every single detail.

’Had he ever truly seen her as family?’

Damien Pierce’s expression became completely composed. Now that he knew Zoe Pierce had "regained her memories," his earlier tension vanished. It was as if the constant, gnawing fear had finally reached its inevitable conclusion.

He sat down in the armchair next to Zoe Pierce.

"Zoe, I never, ever thought about betraying you. It’s just... I’m jealous of you."

Zoe Pierce narrowed her eyes at him.

"I admit it. After I found out you’d lost your memory, I did many things that are hard for you to understand." Damien could afford to be frank now. He had likely already guessed his own fate, but Zoe’s use of the word ’betrayal’ was, in his opinion, going too far.

"But, since you remember, you also know that if you hadn’t insisted on going to inspect that mine, Mom and Dad wouldn’t have worried about you and followed. The accident never would have happened, would it?"

Damien Pierce’s expression was frigid as he spoke. "Zoe Pierce, in this family, you are the one I have always been the most jealous of."

"My father died protecting me, and Mom and Dad treated me as their own flesh and blood. I thought we would truly be one family." Damien Pierce gave a bitter smile. "But... it was still different. They always cared about you a little more, paid a little more attention to you."

"Every time I saw it, I was so envious." He looked out the window. "I can understand that, of course. After all, you’re their biological child."

"My abilities are mediocre. I’m your older brother, and after taking on the responsibilities of an Alpha, I found myself falling further and further behind you."

Damien Pierce let out a low, self-mocking laugh and looked down at his hands. "The harder I tried, the more mistakes I made. And the result? In the end, it was still you, an Omega, who had to fix everything. Mom and Dad looked at me with such disappointment... Do you know how much pain I was in at that moment?"

"I should have been grateful to you for smoothing everything over for me, but you held onto that ledger and told me you would always keep it as a ’warning’ for me."

Damien Pierce lifted his face, the rims of his eyes turning red. "Zoe Pierce, you tell me what ’warning’ means!"

"Isn’t that a threat? That you would use it against me the moment I did anything else wrong?"

He took a deep breath, composing himself.

"I can understand it, though. After all, I made a bad investment. I trusted the wrong people and caused financial problems for our family. So I felt your attitude toward me was justified. It was my fault."

His tears finally fell, full of resentment. "But why? Why? That day, I clearly told them to rest at home, that you would be back soon. Why did they still follow you?"

"Zoe Pierce, tell me I’m wrong. Was I wrong to say that Mom and Dad died because of you?"

Zoe Pierce had wondered what the truth was, but she never imagined that hearing the answer so plainly would be this hard to bear.

She was glad she was already sitting down, otherwise her legs might have buckled.

"Fine, you were injured in that mining accident too. You’re the one Mom and Dad fought so hard to protect, the one who survived." Damien Pierce’s tears dripped onto the carpet. "So I can’t blame you. You didn’t want it to happen, right?"

"You lost your memory. What a perfect excuse."

"You don’t remember who caused Mom and Dad’s deaths. You don’t remember the ledger I was so concerned about. You don’t remember a single thing."

"I had to find a way forward for the Pierce family, and I had to find a home for you, an injured Omega. Where do you think I went wrong? How, exactly, did I betray you?"

"So, your feelings matter, Zoe Pierce, but I, Damien Pierce, have to keep suppressing my own for your sake forever? Is that it?"

Zoe Pierce listened to these words numbly. After Damien Pierce finished his last sentence, she laughed. "So, your so-called ’finding a home for me’ was to have me seduce Miles Sherman and his circle?"

’Such a wonderful home?’

’How ironic.’